


Listen to This

by d__T, Najanaja



Category: The Warriors (1979)
Genre: Blink and you'll miss it shipping, Fluff, Marijuana, the sweetest thing I've ever been involved with tbqh, two friends listening to music on a roof, two friends thinking about the future
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-07
Updated: 2016-09-07
Packaged: 2018-08-13 13:01:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7977667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/d__T/pseuds/d__T, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Najanaja/pseuds/Najanaja
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Snow collects music, all sorts of tapes. But Cowboy's had some trouble getting him to listen to some country, and finally he corners Snow.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Listen to This

They had the boombox; they climbed to the tenement roof, and Cowboy handed a  [ tape ](https://youtu.be/54Hp6T0Xpc4) to Snow. 

"Just listen." He said laconically, but it was the second time he'd pushed the song on Snow.  "Country music isn't what you think.  You don't like it and I'll listen to whatever you want."  

Snow hadn't listened to the tape earlier. He'd meant to, yeah, but he'd gotten a new tape of his own on a trade, and he was hooked on it. Had it on repeat, and Cowboy's tape ended up on the battered table. Cowboy'd taken it back, waited a couple days and tried again.

Snow dropped the boombox from his shoulder, where it rested easily, and pushed the button to open the slot. Cowboy popped the tape in, pressing it shut and starting it with little clicks from the buttons. The tape takes a moment to start and Snow has stepped toward the old roof lookout.

And then he’s focused on the music, paying attention to the words with his eyes shut. He stops walking, drifted to a halt. Cowboy watches him with a gentle smile.

When it's done, he opened his eyes,looking over at Cowboy with a smile. "Hey, it's good. I like it!"

Cowboy smiled.  He rarely removed his hat; he did so now, to slap Snow's shoulder with it.  "And I told you, man!  Every day for a week. That's gonna be your last taste until you come to my place.  I'm not leaving it with you again!"

He slid his hand along the front of the boombox, pushing the silvery stop and eject buttons.  The cassette popped out; he pulled the cardboard jacket from his back pocket, and slipped it inside.  

"You sure did!" Snow’s reply is a little wry, even as he held the boombox steady for Cowboy to work the buttons.

Cowboy walked to the plywood they'd put down in a corner of the roof months ago.  It was a rarely-used lookout, and he and Snow had made it their own.  He swept gravel off the rain-blackened wood with a boot- how did it get there all the time?  

"Go on, put on that  [ bootleg tape ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Plfbya_7yU) of yours.  I know you can't go one hour without it."  The young Warrior sat down and leaned back.

The late breeze up on the roof tempered the summer heat in little gusts, promising a cooler evening for music and conversation, bringing the feeling of new songs and ideas. Snow gently placed the boombox near Cowboy’s boots, then sitting and sprawling so that the boombox is between his legs and he’s companionably close to his friend. Their shoulders just touch. 

The boombox sits between Snow's legs where he can reach it, and tilted so it faces them both. He’d swapped the case for the tape; it's got a scuffed up clear plastic one now through which his weirdly neat writing can nearly be seen on the label. The case goes on top of the boombox, the tape goes in and the song starts soft and a little bitter.

He leaned back again as it started, and leans a little against his mate.

Cowboy grins shyly as Snow presses his bigger frame into him; he really has to brace back, or rock with the touch.  He sways for a moment and then lets his shoulder push into Snow's bicep: hard for a moment, but softening as the man relaxes.  

"Heavy," he says of the music, not of his friend.  "Time is all we're made of?  Hey, at least we're spending it well."

"Made of everything that happened in that time, too." Snow’s reply is soft.

He pulls a joint and lighter out of his pocket and laughs.  Cowboy lights it and inhales, and offers it.   It's not dark enough for an ember to glow, bronze on the handsome curves of Snow's face.  The long evening holds the sun in a thickening sky.  It will rain.  Maybe it will cool.  "What else would we do?  I don't want much more.  Maybe...maybe a car."

Snow is silent again as Cowboy offers the joint. He accepts it, takes a breath and holds it a moment, then lets it go. He holds it out between his fingers for Cowboy to take if he wants.

"Where would you go with a car?" He's curious, maybe a tinge concerned.

Cowboy takes the joint and ponders.  He hadn't thought, honestly.  Would he go cruising, finally noticed by the chicks in the way Snow is noticed?  No, he's kind of comfortable being the regular guy- the one next to the handsome man.  "I could...travel?  Hey!  California."

He nods surely, and passes the joint back.  "California, to meet Clint Eastwood.  And, I don't know, piss in the Pacific.  Where'd you go?"

"California." He tastes each syllable of it. Sure, California's good. He gently nudges Cowboy. "How you gonna get a guy like that to notice a dude like you?"

He chuckles. "If anyone could, it'd be you!"

Snow takes the joint, thinks on it. "In school, they'd make us read all these things. Some'a them bout the way the sky and forest is. I'd like to see a proper forest."

"They've got em in California.  And mountains."  Cowboy rolls his head onto Snow's shoulder and laughs.  "They've got forests on top of mountains, stacked up to the sky.  I'll stand on top of all that, and shout Mr. Eastwood’s name.  Like I'm calling him out!"

"No, but he's cool, he's cool.  I'd give him a pass.  I wouldn't draw my gun on him."  

Their long shadows have begun to fade on the gravel rooftop, which is softening under the sunset, looking more like beach stones, gray and flat.  Cowboy offers the joint, and Snow's strong fingers touch his hand gently.  He sits in thoughts of forests and walking there with Snow.  What would they do?  How would they eat?  What if they saw a bear?  A wolf?  Oh- a rattlesnake!  He frowns.

He shifts to a consideration of the cities.  L.A.  San Francisco.  They'd know how to make it there- but for what reason?  Would they wear the Warriors' mark?  Would they maybe parley, make connections?

Only Snow was heavy muscle, calm and cautious, but not a man of magic, changing things.  Cowboy was only a former locksmith.  He found breaking more profitable than mending.  No one would send them West to find a brother gang.

"Maybe we're good here," he says.

"We good here." Snow agrees.

He turns to Cowboy anyway, a serious look on his face. "Hey! Let's go to California."

It breaks up into a grin. "Cleon can spare us a couple weeks. We could do it."

“Yeah, we could do it.  Someday.  When we’ve done all we need to do here.”

**Author's Note:**

> for $8000 a month we'll write in one tense


End file.
